UPSBossman

For the TL;DR crowd, after just half ofmy L&D rotation, I'm having a freakout about ever having afamily. This is me venting/looking for advice. Many of my classmates have alreadyfallen victim to Nursing Student Syndrome - that moment in everystudent's life when they realize that they have everything they arestudying at the time. But I, being of sound mind and judgment, knew Iwould never fall prey to such foolishness. And being a (G0:P0) male,I was pretty sure L&D wouldn't pose much of a risk so I let myguard down, and they Syndrome got me. At the start of this summer, Iwanted children at some point after graduation, now I don't - atall - ever. Its not a lack of desire to deal with offspring, or thechanges in my family dynamic that comes along with children that hasput me off to the idea, its learning about all the things that can gowrong. My wife and I are about 5 years apart,and she has told me several times (back when I wanted kids at somepoint) that she doesn't want to start having kids until she is 30 atthe earliest (putting me at about 35.) So many of the complicationsof pregnancy are exacerbated or more frequently seen as the age ofthe parents increase. New research is showing as much as a 30-60%increase in chromosomal anomalies as the father's age approaches 40.Maternal complications increase dramatically after 30 as well. Toquote my A&P professor, "Ladies, have all the children you wantuntil you are 30, then stop. You are done. It isn't worth the risk."Now I understand that he was speaking facetiously, and that womenhave healthy and undramatic pregnancies after 30 all the time, butthese words and statistics stick with me. Compounding all of this, is the fastthat my twin brother and his wife were pregnant this year, and gavebirth this summer. They had a very challenging pregnancy, that endedwith their children spending almost 2 months in the NICU. Now afterlearning about and seeing all that can go wrong, I feel like it WILLall go wrong for me (and my wife.) Hell, I'm so bad now I'm terrifiedto hold - or even touch my new niece and nephew. It has me sonervous, I feel like it would be irresponsible of us to try to havekids, and my desire to have a family one day has shut down. Now I don't want children at all. Ifind myself constantly trying to talk myself into the idea that a"child free lifestyle" is what I want, even though part of medoesn't believe that at all. I feel guilty about it, as I've spent myentire adult life wanting them at some point and my wife still wantsthem when she is 30+. We discussed it and she said if, in 5 or soyears I still fell this way then we will just not have kids (becauseshe's awesome and super supportive) but I feel bad every time shereferences something in a "when we have kids" sense. My fears are completely irrational andbased on "what if" scenarios, which I make a habit of notbuilding my life around. But as silly as they are, I can't seem toshake them, and they're changing who I am in ways I don't like.Stupid nursing school. Anyone have advice on how to get over this?

I take my first ATI med/surg test next friday (first semester, WOOT!!) I'm hitting the same scores as you... 64% and 61%, so now I'm very interested in how you end up doing :) Best of luck, and let us know how you do! I'm finding studying for the test very difficult, because the practice tests they have are asking about stuff that we have not covered at all (pharmacology), or about things which we didn't cover we we had classes on them (ATI endocrine practice test killed me) I'm not sure how to study material I've never seen before. When we discussed it in class today, no one has yet hit a 70 on the practice tests. I have an A in class right now (commons) and don't want to lose it to ATI. (I got an 89.7 in fundamentals, and want my A this time!!)

I'm a student nurse about to finish my first semester. Per my understanding, after semester 1 RN students can (generally) work as techs/aids to gain experience. I want to go this route, but I'm unsure how to go about it. The units I'd like to work on are ICU or ED, or a similar, higher acuity unit (big surprise, right?) My question is, how do I go about trying to get one of these jobs? I'm not sure if they even exist, outside of a CNA job on a medsurg floor, which I don't want to do. Can anyone offer up advice on how to make a resume for a student tech/extern job (We are somewhat lacking in experience, after all) and/or how to go about asking around a unit to see if they would be willing to hire us?

I work for Baptist health system [baptisthealthsystem.com] We're hiring nurses at all 5 of our facilities right now. Its a pretty good system. Pay is a little higher at Methodist, but the employee satisfaction is higher at Baptist (and arguably we have better benefits.) Both systems are pretty good.

I decided to go into nursing because my wife is a recent (one year ago) graduate. She was an LVN prior to that (2 years, while we were dating.) While she was working in health care, I worked at UPS and a restaurant, and went to school. My typical day was 9:00 am - 11:30pm M-F, and 9:00am - Midnight on Saturdays. I made pretty good money, but I never saw my wife(to be) and had no time for any hobbies or anything other than work. I liked both jobs, but hated working them. I my wife working 3 days a week and thought, "Thats what I need." So I changed majors in persuit of nursing (AS degree # 8) and killed all the prereques. I loved the classes. I was excited to go, and looked forward to the next set of classes. Thats how I knew I was making the right choice. Now I've been accepted and will have to find a job in 2 years when I graduate as an RN. I have no disillusions that finding a job will be easy: I expect it to be the most difficult job I've ever had to get, and expect it to be highly competitive. But what that job means to me after I get it, having a life and time to spend with the woman I love, is worth the challenge. I wouldn't worry about getting into school. I had a 3.2 GPA and got accepted. I applied to only one school, because its the only one I wanted to go to.

You dont have to eat every 2 hours. I'm a hard gainer and used to eat every 3-4 hours. I never managed to put on much muscle, and my lifts never improved much. Since I started eating paleo I now eat 3 times a day, some times I miss a meal (I'm almost never hungry anymore) but I'm lifting more than I ever have at the gym now. It could be partly that I'm training a bit different now, but I'm still not eating every 2 hours and doing fine.

I will be going to Bapstist School of Health Professions (Wife & several friends graduated from there, and I work for the system now) 3.2 GPA (3.8 in field) 88% on TEAS

$40k isnt bad money, and if you need more then you can work a 4th shift one week (which would be all OT.) My wife made over $45 last year, and she wasn't working as an RN until mid April. OP, why are you asking? From some of your responses, it sounds like you're trying to justify working as a nurse based on the pay... that's the wrong reason to be a nurse. Its good enough of a reason that there are a lot of nurses who do the job just for the money, but they're the nurses who end up on my desk [risk management] often and end up bouncing from facility to facility for related reasons. Look at why you want to be a nurse. If the only thing you come up with is green and fits nicely into a wallet, please don't care for my loved ones.

I'm in San Antonio, Tx. My wife is a RN (1 year now) and we both work at the same system. Here, RNs are starting around $21.50, a little more if you have experience (2 years clinical, 3 years non-clinical)

i'll chime in i suppose. i was wondering, why are nurses in such bad health to begin with? i'm not yet a nurse, but i work in a hospital doing risk management. so many of the nurses here are obese (to put it "lightly,") smoke, i know of several who do drugs... pretty much some of the most unhealthy people i've ever met. and yet they work in an industry that is supposed to encourage people to be healthier. i don't get it. as for diet and hunger, i switched up my diet about 3 months ago, and have had 100% positive results. down to the lightest i've been in 7 or so years, down 2 sizes on my pants, an inch off my belly, lower blood pressure and cholesterol and i almost never feel hungry. that's the weirdest part, never feeling hungry anymore. i have to remind myself to eat, or eat when i don't feel like it or i fear i will come in well below my calorie goal. i’m trying to get my wife to join me on the diet, but you can’t force a horse to drink. exercise is weight lifting 2 – 3 time a week, and 30 min dog walks twice a day. i’m hoping that when i start nursing school in august i don’t lose my way and start gaining, or fall into the unhealthy nursing lifestyle.

i work with nurses all day... a lot of 'em i can't understand how they became nurses. it seriously is one of those "if she can do it, anyone can" moments almost every day for me. every time i start to feel nervous about the program, i think of all of the nurses i deal with and fell much better about nursing school, and myself in general. engineering school is difficult. so far, every class i've taken toward nursing (all my prerequisites) have been much easier than even the entry level engineering classes. a lot of people say nursing school is so difficult, but i question their frame of reference. i really think its what you make of it. if you think its going to be difficult and let yourself succumb to that mentality and fear, than it will be difficult. but if you realize that this stuff really isn't that bad, its easy enough.

I've been an insomniac for more than 10 years, at some times going 5+ days without ANY sleep at all (my longest was a 7 day sleepless bender!) Changed my diet and got more exercise and it cured me. And on the rare occasion that I still can't fall asleep I just use the time to study.

i'd have a field day with your classmates. an entire program full of gullible people who take spoken word as gospel? make up an awesome back story for yourself and slowly hint it to them. feed them slowly like you were reluctant to tell the truth. you're in witness protection or something like that. have fun with 'em. as for them reporting your failures and not your successes, have someone else recognize your successes. when you do something well, ask one of the seniors "is this great or what?" then talk about how well you did it in class. just put the word out there. if the instructors are as gullible as the students, just tell them you did awesome and they should believe you. i know its not that easy, but work with what you've got. also, be careful with your sarcastic comebacks.

My advice would be to wait a week or so for a call, then call the manager back and ask him if they were interviewing yet. Explain about how HR got an attitue with you but you want to work there. He's the one who decides your fait, not HR

Lots of resume services online. My brother writes for one of them from time to time. Prices vary. Look into another job in the mean time. Something disposable to let you keep your apartment and your freedom.